


Losing

by argentkosmos



Series: 30 Ways To Say "I Love You" [3]
Category: Ben 10 Series
Genre: 30 ways to say "i love you", Angst, Arguing, F/M, Fluff, Things Go Wrong, about how much they love each other, because they do so very much, fighting nasty aliens, gratuitous blathering about energy and trust, just a little bit, prompt: over and over till it's nothing but a senseless babble, relationship study if you squint very hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:40:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25939066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/argentkosmos/pseuds/argentkosmos
Summary: Prompt: Over and over, till it's nothing but a senseless babbleShe floated towards him, getting him upright with the sole strength of her mind.“Kevin, you need to absorb my energy” she told him. He could hear her, somehow, she was certain of that.
Relationships: Kevin Levin/Gwen Tennyson
Series: 30 Ways To Say "I Love You" [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1853857
Kudos: 30





	Losing

**Author's Note:**

> It's me again, hi!! Thank you opening this story, I'll just leave some notes before we start!
> 
> \- I still haven't watched omniverse, so if I say some stupid/inaccurate stuff, I'm very sorry  
> \- english is not my first language and I don't have a beta, mistakes are all on me and I'd appreciate it a lot if you could point them to me, so I can correct them  
> \- this should've been the "A scream" prompt (third), but as I went on with the the writing I realized that didn't fit the mood of the story and switched it with the 16th prompt  
> \- if you want to take a look at the prompts here they are on [my tumblr](https://argentkosmos.tumblr.com/post/624664653351600128/i-love-you-prompts)
> 
> Thank you for staying with me and I hope you'll like the story, enjoy!

“KEVIN!”

Ben’s voice drowned out every other sound and Gwen let got of the last alien she had defeated to jump in the opposite direction.

Creating mana platforms to step on, she climbed up to where Ben was fighting as Jetray. “What happened?”

Ben aimed a laser shot from his eyes to another group of aliens and did a three-sixty to scan the area in search of his teammate.

“He was just fighting over there and then these things were all over him…” he pointed at the aliens swarming on the ground. They looked just like cockroaches, with legs, antennae and all, only a weird, deep shade of green with neon blue accents and the size of a small dog.

Another laser shot. “I don’t see him anymore, Gwen!”

Her eyes flashed to the ground and she immediately tried to detect Kevin’s mana among the aliens.

They weren’t particularly strong, she knew that, it only took a hit to knock them out, but there were too many of them and their teeth were strong enough to tear steel. She had studied them before arriving on the planet to fight, and they had the ability to bite and suck out the life force from their victims so if Kevin had been overpowered and captured, Gwen was aware he could only have a few minutes left.

The chaos of aliens amassed under her made her sick to her stomach, still she tried to focus even more and finally was able to spot her partner.

She built a bubble of mana around herself and threw it on the ground, crushing some of the creatures and flying some others across the street. She immediately felt tiny claws scratching her shield, the sound of gritted teeth filling her ear. She could smell the stench of their rotting breath from the inside.

She rolled her bubble through the chaos of alien limbs and to where she felt Kevin’s energy, fainter and fainter.

Projecting two mana’s ropes, she let her instinct guide them until they curled around what had to be her boyfriend’s unconscious body. It felt like touching his bare skin. She couldn’t possibly mistake it for anything else.

She pulled him to herself, opening a gap in her shield big enough for the body to pass.

She wanted to look at him, talk to him, do anything to check his wellbeing, but there still were dozens and dozens of aliens around them and she couldn’t lose focus.

She bounced her bubble a couple of times until it landed on the rooftop of the nearest building and finally the disgusting buzzing from the creatures subsided. She knew she didn’t have much time because those things could climb walls. She lowered he shield, leaning Kevin’s body on the bare concrete. “I’ll be right back, _please_ hang in there” she said. The mana bubble around him hadn’t disappeared and Gwen forced herself to keep it standing even while fighting.

She watched as Ben took care of a good dozen of those nasty big bugs with a bunch of laser shots, but they just kept coming and he was starting to tire out too much.

She wasn’t going to leave him by himself like she did with Kevin, she was never going to forgive herself if anything happened to Ben too.

While she looked at those creatures, wriggling and swarming one on top of another to climb up the building, Gwen felt herself being filled with pure, powerful energy. She knew that feeling and she let it consume her, eat her up like a starving animal.

Her hearing was heightened and so was her sight and her perception. She could see all the little flames of vital force in the bodies of her enemies.

Her first instinct, the destructive one, driven by blind rage and fear for her loved ones, told her to steal it, leave those bodies empty and dry, kill them all without them realizing it.

Then something else, a voice she recognized but could not put a face to, told her not to do it and find another way without letting herself being devoured by the desire for revenge.

Gwen sighed, inhaling in herself all the power of the Universe and, with arms stretched to the front and palms down, she manipulated that same energy in their bodies to make them numb without killing them.

The aliens abruptly keeled over to the ground, exhausted.

Gwen heard Ben’s sigh of relief before he landed next to her and turned back to his human form.

“You were great! As always!” he said, proud, before giving his attention to his unconscious teammate.

In her Anodite form Gwen was able to sense a difference in Kevin’s mana, something that always used to be there and now wasn’t.

And it was the same thing that made it so difficult to find him amongst the aliens. Kevin’s vital energy, the glowing flame, was almost extinguished. Panic rose in her chest.

She floated towards him, getting him upright with the sole strength of her mind.

“Kevin, you need to absorb my energy” she told him. He could hear her, somehow, she was certain of that.

“Gwen you can’t do that! He will lose control again!”

Ben’s voice was muffled and Gwen knew he was right, that it was possible, but she also knew that it was the only thing she could do to keep Kevin’s flame from dying.

“He’ll die if I don’t try it, trust him.”

“It’s not our Kevin I don’t trust, it’s the other one, the power-mad one. He already hurt you once, he could do it again.” He got closer and grabbed her arm. “Gwen you can’t do it, it’s too dangerous and if he absorbed your power in your alien form it could be impossible for us to get him back to normal!”

He was right but she couldn’t give up, she couldn’t risk losing Kevin. She looked down to where Ben was and even if he couldn’t read her expression in that form, Gwen hoped he could still feel how desperate she was. She couldn’t let Kevin die, she couldn’t.

Ben hold her stare for long seconds then shook his head. “Alright then. Do it. But know that if he doesn’t stop, I won’t hesitate to rip both his arms off.”

Gwen nodded right away, evaluating his words. Ben was like that, he loved Kevin with his whole being and there was no doubting it, but he was able to detach the power-hungry being from his friend and he was able to make drastic decisions if the situation called for it. Gwen, despite everything, was still glad to have him with her.

She turned to Kevin and took his hands. She could feel the little strands of energy tickling her, the power of a black hole just under the skin she knew oh-so-well.

“Wake up” she ordered and maybe it was her voice, maybe just the proximity to such an immense source of pure and powerful energy, but Kevin really woke up and his parched body decided before he could realize what was happening.

He took her fingers in a painful grip, so different from the gentleness he always touched her with, and yet Gwen didn’t let any pained sound out. She kept quiet, even when her energy started flowing form her body to Kevin’s, reviving the flame burning in his every cell.

He was glowing with energy, her energy he made his, more and more and more, until his flame went ablaze and Gwen started to feel the danger of the situation.

She closed her eyes.

He was going to stop, he was. And nothing mattered, not Ben’s concerned voice, not the pain of her energy being taken, it didn’t matter because she was giving it out of love.

And then everything stopped.

Kevin’s hands slid off hers and his body slumped to the ground and Gwen fell in front of him, human again.

Ben was quickly beside them. “Are you guys… okay?”

Kevin turned to look at him, but his eyes were empty, not really there yet. “I thought I was going to die…” he said, voice a trembling and scared. He looked at Gwen. “I thought I was going to hurt you.”

“It’s okay, it’s over” she whispered, caressing his cheek with her thumbs, a smile on her face to emphasize her words. “You’re safe.”

Ben let out a loud sigh, body shaking with quiet laughter. Before, she would’ve scolded him for laughing in such a situation, but now she knew it was just his way of lightening the mood, of processing the load of negative emotions he was subjected to every single day. She smiled at him and mouthed a soundless “thank you”. Ben smiled back.

Kevin was just there, surrendered to her touch. “I recognized your energy, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have absorbed it, but I was so empty and tired and it was just there, just under my fingers…”

“I wanted you to absorb it, think of it like a gift.” She pushed his hair out of the way. “Anniversary gift.”

“Isn’t it in four months?” Kevin scoffed and Ben whistled, impressed.

“I didn’t think you would remember it!” he said and that earned him a glare.

“Ha, ha, thank you very much, Tennyson.”

And that sparked a new wave of laughs.

Gwen leaned to rest her head on Kevin’s shoulder, still in disbelief that everything turned out for the better,

*

The difficult part though, was yet to come.

And it came that same night when Gwen was about to fall asleep with Kevin’s quiet breaths fanning her neck.

“Gwen?”

It was thin, his voice, not even a whisper. As subtle as his fingers ghosting on the bare skin of her arm.

She snuggled further against him. “Yes?”

“I know you said it doesn’t matter, but I really am sorry about taking your energy, I should have resisted it” he said after a brief pause.

And okay, Gwen was expecting something like that, especially after all that they had been through due to his hunger for power. But that Kevin didn’t exist anymore and what had happened just a few hours before was enough to prove it.

“I told you, I wanted you to take it, you didn’t steal it” she reiterated, a smile on her lips even if he couldn’t see it.

“But what if I hadn’t stopped?” He tightened his hold around her shoulders.

“Ben was there and you stopped, it’s all that matters.”

A sigh.

“Still, it was dangerous, you shouldn’t have done that.”

Gwen rolled on her side, hands to her chest and knees slightly folded in fetal position, to look at him straight in the eyes. She wasn’t smiling. “Don’t tell me what I should have done or not, it was my decision, not yours, not Ben’s, not anyone else’s.”

She laid on her back and stared at the ceiling. “You can’t… you can’t ask me to let you die, because I will not, ever. Even if it meant risking my own life.”

“See? That’s the problem Gwen, you think risking your life for mine is the right choice but what if you died trying to save me? I wouldn’t be able to live with myself, and in a situation like today, if I had…”

Kevin sat up with his legs crossed. “And it’s not just that, it’s not just about guilt, it’s…” he didn’t finish.

Gwen stared at him for a few moments waiting for him to conclude and when he didn’t she kneeled in front him. Kevin still didn’t say a word, eyes locked to her empty pillow.

“It’s what, Kevin?”

He took a breath as his fingers gripped and fisted the sheets. “It’s that I can’t…” he lowered his face even more, like he was ashamed and the mere thought of saying what was on his mind was painful.

“Kevin?” Gwen cupped his face, guiding it up until her eyes met his dark ones.

They were watery, Kevin’s cheeks were wet. “I can’t lose you. Not an option.”

It was something he had already confessed a long time ago but hearing it again in that exact moment, seeing Kevin’s lips forming those words, his glossy eyes accentuating how sure and honest he was about what he said, it was just like the first time.

And Kevin didn’t stop there. It was like something snapped inside him and he couldn’t help himself. «And Ben too. You both gave me another chance, you showed me there was another way of existing in this world, you helped me make up with my mum and my past… you’re the most important people in my life.” He pressed the palm of his hand to his eyes and let out a breathy laugh. “Well, you’re more important, but don’t tell Ben.”

Gwen smiled upon hearing that without realising there were tears in her eyes too. She knew how much courage it had taken him to open up like that and she was grateful.

“So please, don’t let me absorb your energy ever again” Kevin said, repeating it a second time.

There were too many pieces in their relationship that had yet to be discovered and put in place, and there were times she wanted to give up because it was too complicated and because maybe it would’ve been better if she had fallen in love with one of his college classmates, just like her mother still secretly hoped to this day. Sometimes she found herself thinking that it would’ve been easier to have an ordinary relationship, without aliens, without fights, without having to risk her life everyday and without having to see the people she loved being constantly in danger. Without having to choose between helping them and put herself in danger, or watching them get hurt or worse.

Sometimes she just wanted to retire, choose the easy way out and let the world exist around her, let others take care of it.

But Gwen was never the type to surrender in the face of adversity, she never abandoned a cause she believed in.

And saving the world, being the one to make the difference, being there to help the ones in need were all things she blindly believed in.

And she believed in Kevin too, she believed in his strong willpower, she believed in it because she had seen him change for the better, because she had seen him fall and get up again, and because their relationship wasn’t one-sided.

She helped Kevin overcome his insecurities, she supported his ideas and even if she didn’t really care for engines and spaceships, she was more than glad to listen to him talk about that with shining eyes and steady voice. And it was Kevin to be by her side when she found out about her alien nature, he knew how to stand up to her when needed, how to make her laugh and, despite her mother thinking otherwise, Kevin was also the one to motivate her to do more and better. He helped her study both directly, when he was educated about the topics, and indirectly, whether it was only a massage at the end of the day or a take away meal delivered to her house along a sweet kiss and sweeter words. She gave Kevin the balance he never had and Kevin was able to break the balance she had to maintain her entire life.

All those things, and something more Gwen could not pinpoint but could feel even in that moment, were what made her continue to walk the same path, every day.

Gwen brushed Kevin’s wet cheekbone with a finger, drying the single tear there. “I believe in you and I trust you.”

“It’s not about this, Gwen. I don’t trust myself and it’s something I have to live with” he said and diverted his gaze.

“Or,” she caressed his face once more. “you can work on it like you’ve done on so many other things in the last few years, and overcome it. I know you can.”

Kevin moved away from her touch without looking at her. “Not that simple.”

“I know, love.” Kevin perched up at those words, eyes wide in surprise. “I’m not saying you have to wake up tomorrow without doubts and negative thoughts, what I’m saying is I know what you’re capable of and I know you can do this too.”

Kevin sighed. “Maybe.”

He didn’t agree but it was a start and Gwen could feel his sincerity from his glowing aura all around his figure. A light that never felt too much different than her own. It was even more similar now that he had adsorbed her energy. His aura had changed the first time he stole her power, at that time he had adsorbed even more and his aura was drenched in Gwen’s mana, but it was whirling around, unsettled, trapped in Kevin’s scorching flame.

This time though, it felt almost like her energy had wrapped itself around Kevin’s weaker one, protecting it from the outside to give it time and allow it to go back to normal.

“Kev?”

“Hm?”

“You’re important to me, too.” She leaned forward, legs sliding around Kevin’s waist. “Losing you is not an option for me too. I want it to be very clear. And I’m sorry but I’m not rethinking this decision.”

In their new position, Kevin had to look up at her and Gwen liked it a little too much, since she was always the one to stand on her tip toes to reach him. His eyes roamed over her face from her green, determined irises, to her petite nose covered in constellations of tiny little freckles, to her red lips.

“Okay, I get it” he then said. “I was expecting something like this” he added a moment later.

Gwen adjusted over his crossed legs. “Did you just call me predictable?” she asked, but her tone revealed she was just relieved that their conversation had finally shifted to a more relaxed atmosphere.

Kevin laughed and shook his head. “Just a little, sometimes.”

Gwen tickled his side, faking annoyance when Kevin winded his arms around her middle. “All jokes aside, I do understand, because I wouldn’t stop trying to save your life even if you forced me not to” he explained.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

She nuzzled their nose together, giggling like a teenager at her first crush.

“You know I love you, right?” Kevin asked out of the blue, arms tightened around her, and pushed her against the mattress.

“Do I? I think you should tell me again, just to be sure, you know.”

Kevin rolled his eyes and pinched her tight, earning himself another snicker. “I love you.”

“Love you, love you, love you, love you, love you…” he followed every word with more pinches until Gwen’s contagious laugh made him start losing his composure and his voice was lost in a chaos of giggles, hiccups and requests for truce.

Those were the moments that overshadowed everything else, Kevin’s lips on hers, his laughs, his warmth and his mana (always familiar, so so familiar) welcoming her home as much as hers did with his.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! It would make me very happy if you could leave a comment or a kudos 🥰  
> I hope you are staying safe with all that is happening and i hope you have a great rest of your day/night 💗  
> L


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